Public educators rally for school finance

Hundreds of Texas public school teachers, rallying Monday at the Capitol, left state lawmakers with some homework for the rest of the year’s legislative session:

Allocate more money for schools. Require less testing. And say no to vouchers.

Those demands – laid out by about 1,000 educators, many on the first day of their Spring Break – came as contentious statehouse battles loom on school finance, standardized testing and school choice.

“Public education is under assault in the state of Texas,” said state Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, cheered on by the crowd. “Without our school children we might as well give up on Texas’ future.”

Monday’s rally was organized by the Texas American Federation of Teachers as part of their annual lobbying day. Educators from across the state — including the San Antonio Alliance of Teachers and Support Personnel and the Houston Federation of Teachers – flooded statehouse hallways to charm, coax and cajole local representatives.

Facing a harrowing fiscal outlook, lawmakers in 2012 slashed $5.4 billion from the state’s public school systems and education grant programs. The cuts brought the amount Texas spends per student each year to $8,400 – less than any other state in the country, save Arizona and Nevada.

Though a state district judge ruled last month that Texas’ school finance system was inadequate and unconstitutional, Attorney General Greg Abbott has appealed the decision.

In the meantime, Davis, the Fort Worth senator, said she hopes for a legislative fix. Already this session, proposals have emerged that would restore some of those cuts, including a bill by Davis and others that would draw $4.5 billion the state’s Rainy Day Fund.

But other groups, including those lobbying for road funding and water supply projects, have also staked claims on the $8.1 billion pot, which is financed primarily through oil and gas tax revenue.